Model Lashawna Threatt Dies in Fall From Atlanta Hotel Window
Family and friends say window shattered when she and friend leaned on it.
May 31, 2011— -- Family and friends of LaShawna Threatt, a model who fell to her death from an Atlanta hotel room when she and a friend leaned against a large window, are questioning how the hotel could not have had shatterproof glass in the 10th floor room.
Threatt and her friend Cierra Williams fell from a 10th floor window at the W Atlanta-Midtown hotel early Saturday morning, as a celebration of her 30th birthday was winding down.
"It was a freak accident," Ray Hamilton, Threatt's boyfriend, told ABC News.
Hamilton said at around 3:15 a.m. the two women were playing around, hugging and tickling each other, when they leaned back on the nearly floor-to-ceiling window. The glass shattered and they both fell out.
He and another friend standing close by tried to grab them, he said, but they were unable to keep them from falling.
"It was just a split second," he said.
Williams' body was found on the ground, while Threatt's body remained on a slanted sunroof adjoining the hotel, according to Atlanta police spokesman Carlos Campos.
Threatt was pronounced dead on the scene, and Williams, 25, is in critical condition at Grady Memorial Hospital.
Hamilton said he has a lot of questions about the window.
"How could they break the window just by leaning on it? Why wasn't it shatter proof?" Hamilton said. "You would think it would be secure."
Passionate Chonvill, who owns a marketing company and is a friend of Threatt, told the Atlanta Journal Constitution she couldn't understand how the weight of two slender women leaning against it could have caused the glass to break.
"They are two small girls and I am trying to figure out how the hell, two small girls could break a window like that," she told the AJC.
In an interview with the Atlanta newspaper, Hamilton agreed.
"It's been a nightmare for me," Hamilton told the newspaper. "How do two girls who weigh maybe 120 pounds a piece, standing at the window, build up enough force to not only break it but go out immediately?"
In a statement released Monday, Campos said the police are not investigating any aspect of the hotel windows, only whether there was any criminal activity involved in the incident.
"At this time, we have no reason to believe this was anything other than a tragic accident," Campos said.
Police are awaiting toxicology results. Hamilton, though, said no one was drunk.
The hotel has declined to discuss the incident, after manager Michael O'Donohue issued a statement Saturday.
"The incident at the W Atlanta early Saturday is very tragic and our thoughts and prayers are with the woman who was injured and the family and friends of the woman who died in the fall," the statement said. "There is a police investigation underway and all information must come from the authorities."
Threatt, Williams, and other friends had been out celebrating Threatt's birthday at a dinner Friday night. Afterwards they went to a lounge at the hotel for dancing, and later a smaller group retreated to the hotel room on the 10th floor.
Hamilton said they had only been in the room for about 10 minutes when the incident happened.
He said he thinks Threatt's mother is having an attorney look into the case for a possible civil lawsuit, but ABC News was unable to reach the young woman's mother for comment.
Now Hamilton and Threatt's family are planning her funeral for later this week. Hamilton said Threatt is survived by a teenage daughter.
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